


Even So, Mei Miao

by qwanderer



Category: Firefly
Genre: F/M, injury to a child, not actually all that graphic though, post-BDM, sexy metaphorical imagery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-25
Updated: 2013-04-25
Packaged: 2017-12-09 11:42:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/773808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beauty of life is not made less by its flaws. For some the very act of living is an art form.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I stole the idea for Hoban Washburne Jr. to be called Banny for short from some other fic author, I'm sorry that I forget who. He was named Benny in the first draft and then I saw that and it seemed too perfect.

Chinese:

 **Ai ya:** holy crap

 **Chou nao:** stinking mud

 **Di di:** little brother

 **Mei miao:** beautiful (art)

 **Zao gao:** dammit

* * *

"No, Simon, you can't come in my room. It's _my_ room. I told you. It's private."

"Kaylee, I love you. I'd like to share…everything with you. I'd like a space that's _ours,_ not just mine or yours or everyone's. I can understand that you need your own space. If that's your cabin, I wish you'd spend more time in my room, treat it like it's ours."

"Well, your room's all right sometimes. But what's wrong with the engine room?"

"The _engine room_ …Kaylee, isn't this at _all_ personal to you?"

"It _is_ …the engine room's my favorite place. I spend more time in here anyways. I remember my first time aboard…well, you wouldn't want to hear about _that,_ I guess."

Cap'n came in. "Don't reckon he would. And I seem to recall asking my engineer at the time was there _something wrong with his bunk_. At least you two have the courtesy to shut the door."

Kaylee turned pink. Simon turned red.

Kaylee looked up at Mal. "Well, you do have a way of sneakin' up on private situations, Cap'n. Inara's complained of that more'n once."

"Well in my mind, anything that goes on in my boat's my business. Especially if it's not going on _in your cabin_." He cleared his throat. "So, little Kaylee, how's the work goin' on that double backup life support system?"

"You're gonna keep calling me that till I'm old and grey, arent'cha, Cap'n?"

"O'course. You're my little Kaylee. No amount o' grey hairs can change that. Including the ones you give me."

There was a bit of technical talk, and Mal left again.

Simon turned back to her.

"So…wait. You were…in here…with someone else…you're both right, I did _not_ want to know that."

"Hey, I wasn't going to say anything."

He got that I'm-annoyed-but-explain-this-to-me-anyway look on his face. "So, is it me, or the engine, that you want to be with?"

She turned pink again. Twice in one day! "Oh…well…both. I mean, you. But….Well, here, I'll explain it this way. Some girls like romance an' flowers an' music an' candles….It makes it…you know…better. Well, I like engines."

"Kaylee, when I sleep with someone, I like that to not just mean sex. I like to sleep in the same bed with that person. That means almost as much to me. It's sharing a big part of your life."

* * *

There are still warrants out for the arrest of River and her brother but as the years have gone by she has started to look less and less like her bedraggled test-subject mug shot and more like a happy healthy young woman. The Alliance has lost a whole fleet of cruisers and an elite operative to their search for her. Since Miranda's secret was revealed, it has become more difficult to keep the population of even the core planets complacent. They simply don't have the resources to pursue River and uphold the law while they are rebuilding their fleet. And River has honed her senses and learned Serenity's helm so well that getting away before danger catches them up is almost a certainty. It all adds up to a bit more slack for Serenity and for most criminal operations.

_"Die, Alliance scum! Eat T-Rex!"_

_"Thanks, we will. Better than the purplebelly we've been eating since you cut off our supplies. Cannibalism's gross!"_

_And there was the cry of a great beast fallen, and they divided it among their numbers and devoured it like the hungry savages they were. But there were more dinosaurs to come, and those dining became those dined upon, and vice versa, in good time._

_"Raaaahrhh!" Behold the carnage._

_"Filthy browncoats! You will rue the day you - " Boom. And his ribcage became visible. Apparently the first dinosaur was rigged with grenades._

_But now the Alliance will reveal their secret weapon, cunningly disguised as a plastic palm tree._

River found where Wash used to hide his dinosaurs when he wasn't playing with them. All she had to do was listen. They whispered and giggled to themselves. They had the feeling of Wash to them; part of his spirit had given them life, and it remained in them. Now they were hers, as much as they were anyone's. Well, they belonged to Serenity.

Enter Hoban Washburne Junior. "Wivvewr, you playin' with Daddy's toys?"

River's face lit up. "Banny! Yes, I'm playing Alliance versus Dinosaurs. It's very exciting. The alliance was just about to reveal their secret weapon."

"C'n I play?"

"Okay. Do you want to be Alliance or Dinosaurs?"

"Dinosawurs!"

"Well then, I get to crush you with the hidden super laser cannon!" River held up the plastic palm tree as if it were a tiny gun.

"But my dinosors awr awmor plated!"

"Oh, no, _di di,_ the Alliance is in trouble now!"

Zoë watched from the hatchway. It was wonderful to see. There was so much joy on River's face, and nothing else, when she was lost in that childhood world with little Hoban. They had all been getting to know the real River since Miranda; slowly, she was getting better. And at the same time, they were getting to know Banny. Zoë suspected Banny had helped all of them more'n a little to get through the past few years. He was like some sort of highly mobile energy cloud with curly brown hair, more often laughing than not.

* * *

-flashback-

"Zoë, that's – how can you even do that?"

"I got the doc to take a sample before we buried him. He said he'd keep it for me until I was ready. Well I won't wait any more, because waiting just takes away possibilities. I want my family."

"Zoë, you can't – you can't just up and decide to have a baby on my boat. I don't do babies. Serenity don't do babies. They're small, they get lost, and they lead to all kinds of trouble. Plus that whole takin' a sample thing is just creepifyin' to me."

"I don't see that it's any of your business, Sir."

The captain saw the look on his second's face. " _Zao gao,_ it's going to be like with Wash all over again, isn't it. You follow my orders, you behave like a reasonable person, and then suddenly…." Mal sighed deeply. "You go and do somethin' that reminds me you're a woman, and that is a species that confuses me to no end. All right, fine, just don't blame me if it gets lost. And don't let the thing spit up on me too much."

-/flashback-

* * *

Persephone. They were taking on passengers again. Kaylee sat in her deck chair on the loading ramp. She remembered…here was the first place she'd seen Simon. He'd actually looked…almost…intimidating. His face was closed and hard like a steel deck plate. Now she knew he'd been scared out of his wits, but she still remembered that first impression, the look in his eyes like he knew things, secret things that would make your skin crawl. She'd felt a thrill go through her right there….

She came back to herself and she realized the shadow standing over her wasn't a memory. "Oh! Hello!" He did remind her a bit of Simon – a tall, young, thin-faced man with brown hair and a look like he didn't quite know what he was doing here. "Interested in buying a fare aboard our Serenity here?"

"I remember this ship," the young man said. "This is Jayne's ship, isn't it?"

"Well, yeah, I guess you could say that…." Kaylee looked from his face to his clothes. "Say, you look awful respectable to know Jayne. Who are you?"

"Oh, sorry. I'm Fess Higgins."

"Well, glad to meet'cha. I'm Kaylee. So how _do_ you know Jayne?"

"Actually, I've never met him, but he's something of a legend on the moon I'm from. His ship landed once five or six years ago and I caught a glimpse of it. I was actually...uh…does the lady Inara still ship out with you?"

A knowing look came to Kaylee's face. "That she does, but she don't take clients no more." She smiled. "Cap'n wouldn't stand for it."

"Inara…not take clients….Why?"

"Oh, it's so exciting. They're gettin' married!"

There was a sort of deflated look on Fess's face at this point.

Zoë and Jayne had appeared out of the milling crowds, carrying a container of supplies. As they were starting up the ramp, Kaylee called out, "Hey Jayne, guess what. It's one of your fans from the land of _chou nao_."

Jayne looked him up and down. "He don't look like no mudder."

Fess's eyes lit up. "You're Jayne Cobb? I've always wanted to meet you! I…I'd like to become a member of your crew."

Jayne rolled his eyes. "Sure grovels like one. Well, kid, sadly I ain't the captain of this boat, and if I was I'd shoot ya just to teach you a lesson." Zoë glared at him. He sighed. "But the captain'd be mad. Mal's got a weakness for lost pups like you, so it's him y'want to be talkin' to. What's yer name, kid?"

"Fess Higgins." He held out his hand.

Jayne's eyes went round. " _Ai ya!_ Yer that magistrate's kid. You gonna make any trouble over that money I stole?"

"No, sir. I've always wanted to defy my father the way you did. And I did take quite a bit of his money with me when I left, in fact, so you're not the one he's angry at right at the moment."

"Shiny. Another fugitive aboard. That's exactly what this ship needs."

* * *

"You know that what we do ain't strictly legal, right?" Fess nodded. "Now how do I know you won't turn us all over to the feds?"

"Hmm. Well – anyone else on your crew – how did you know they wouldn't?"

"I guess I didn't – one of 'em tried it, in fact. But I'd rather that not happen again. And you really don't look like the typical criminal looking for work."

"Well, I'm not especially fond of the alliance; I can't imagine anyone is, after word got out about the experiments on Miranda. I'm not entirely sure my father hasn't reported me to them himself about stealing his money. Also, I imagine if I was an Alliance mole trying to infiltrate your crew, I'd try harder to look like the typical criminal looking for work."

Mal looked at him for a second. "Well, you've got a way with words, that's somethin'. What other skills do you have that you think might be useful to us?"

"Well, I can pilot a shuttle…"

"Can you cook?"

"Yes, a bit…"

"You're hired."

* * *

In the little lounge area off the kitchen River was focusing on her drawing. It was of the dancers on Jiangyin, before they had been kidnapped. She was drawing from memory; it was incredibly accurate, and full of life and feeling and motion and color. Yellow with flashes of pink and black and brown. She remembered it as if it was before her eyes. She was learning to control the tools built into her brain meant to control her.

Fess walked into the silent kitchen, and it was a minute before he noticed her. "Oh, hello," he said. He walked over to look at her drawing. Before he could comment she spoke.

"It's a beautiful picture but it's not true. They're not carefree. Every life has pain in it."

"Even so, _mei miao._ "

She put her paper aside and turned to look at him. "Fess Higgins. You were going to tell me. I know. I'm River."

"You're a mind reader?"

River put her booted feet up on another chair, and crossed them. The motion had a sort of swagger to it. "One of the great wonders of the 'verse." She smiled at Fess.

Then her eyes flicked across the room. "Little Bubble is coming."

Fess looked at the door, but he saw no one. Then a tan, brown-haired toddler came running in, towards River. He stopped when he saw Fess.

"Banny!" cried River, and swept him up onto her lap. He laughed. "This is Fess," she said, pointing up at the young man. "He's very nice. He wants to ride in Serenity with us."


	2. Chapter 2

**Cai bu shi:** no way (that's not true)

 **Dian dao:** crazy, reversed, mixed up

 **Ge ge:** elder brother

 **Mei mei:** younger sister

 **Nan kan:** embarrassing, unendurable

* * *

River took Serenity up through the clouds. She tried to keep the ride smooth, but she reflected as the winds buffeted the ship that Serenity rarely lived up to her name. She could feel the little vibrations caused by…surprise…Mal and Inara arguing. Again.

Mal was walking through the ship as if he actually had to be somewhere. He wasn't running. And Inara wasn't chasing him. She was just walking, also, slightly behind him, trying to talk to him.

Mal turned his head to see she was still there as they entered the kitchen. "I ain't sayin' _you_ shouldn't. The preacher was right about some things, I've reason to know. But I ain't goin' in one of those places. Not ever."

"Mal, I'm not asking you to…." Inara suddenly frowned in confusion as she saw who was sitting in front of her. "… _Fess Higgins?_ "

His eyes widened, and he stood to greet her. "Hello, Inara."

Mal looked interested. "You two know each other?" Then it clicked in his head. " _Cai bu shi,_ don't tell me, he's a client."

"Well, yes, he has been."

"I brought one of your gorram clients onto my boat?"

Jayne, sitting at the end of the table, snickered.

Inara looked flustered, but not displeased to see him. "Fess, I wasn't expecting to see you again."

"Now that I believe. But what I'm wonderin' is whether you were expectin' to see her."

Fess looked extremely awkward. "I didn't know, when I first came on, that she was getting married or that she was even here…I thought this was Jayne's ship. I was looking for him as much as Inara."

"But you were lookin' for Inara. With a particular purpose in mind, I don't doubt."

"I don't intend to answer that, Captain Reynolds."

"Aw, you know what that means. Besides, I saw the look on his face when he heard about you and Inara." Jayne grinned evilly.

"Jayne!" Inara looked like she might slap him.

"But once you knew, you stayed," Mal said.

Fess gulped, then began slowly. "There is more than one meaning to the word 'companion,'" he said.

"Which don't change the fact that she ain't one anymore."

"Mal…."

"Why do you have to go chasin' my Inara? Anyone else would do just as well for you. Any willin' woman, assuming you can find one."

Inara's eyes blazed. "Mal, that was just mean."

"No wait, I mean….See, this is why I don't…." _This is why I don't talk about the things that I really care about._

He closed his mouth, and turned around, and left.

"Mal, wait!" Inara ran after him.

Fess turned to Jayne, who was still laughing. "Well, that was _nan kan._ "

* * *

Zoë stood and watched as River piloted and Banny played with the dinosaurs. Serenity was out of the atmosphere, and River was laying in a course. Almost ready to fire up the big glowy engine. But then something beeped unexpectedly.

River glanced at the console. "It's a wave, from Monty's ship. Zoë, you want to answer it?"

"Sure." Zoë went to the console and flipped some switches. "Serenity here. Hey, Ray, what's up?"

"Well, Monty's got himself into some trouble with the law back on Kerry, but we're already late for our delivery, so we were wondering if Mal wanted to do an old buddy a favor and pick him up."

"Kerry? That's not too far. We don't have any jobs waitin' on us and we didn't pick up much in the way of passengers. So what happened?"

"Nothin' major, just a bar fight – the usual, you know, old browncoat loyalties on a moon of a core planet. They're all bein' held for a few days before the hearing. He'd rather it didn't get that far; they might figure out who he is an' connect him to some other suspicious activities."

"Sounds like somethin' we could handle. I'll talk to Mal. You gonna be on Persephone for a couple of days?"

"Yeah."

"We'll plan on meetin' you there with Monty. I'll wave you again after I talk to Mal."

* * *

Fess wandered the ship, getting a feel for Serenity. He wondered where River was. She was the pilot, wasn't she? He went up to the front of the ship.

Zoe was there, with little Hoban on her hip. They made a comfortable picture, like Banny had always been there. Simon stood by River, hand on her shoulder while she piloted. River's hands moved gracefully over the dials and buttons. Even sitting, she seemed to dance.

"You've been arguing with Kaylee again, haven't you," she was saying to her brother. It wasn't a question.

"A little. I don't understand her. We're so close in some ways, but in other ways…I just can't make my way into her life. It's like a maze. I run into dead ends where I never expected."

Zoe spoke. "Two people can have very different expectations. I remember Wash saying some very similar things about trying to understand me."

"Well at least he got one straight answer out of you – a yes. Whenever I even mention getting married she goes all…sort of uncomfortable. And quiet. That's sort of disturbing. You usually don't get a quiet Kaylee even when she says she isn't talking to you. But when we talk about…well…the physical aspects of our relationship…it seems like she doesn't have any boundaries."

"Well, Kaylee's never been exactly shy about that sort of thing."

"That's very true." Simon smiled. "In a lot of ways."

Now Simon was thinking about Kaylee. Zoe was remembering Wash. And Fess….

River adjusted the course one final time, then got up and ran from the room without a word or a glance.

* * *

Simon found River sitting on the stairs by the passenger dorm, looking more overwhelmed than she had in a long time. He came and sat by her and put an arm around her. "River, what's wrong?"

"I know things, I can't help knowing. People's feelings. But I don't know what to do about them. Everyone else's mind is like an open book; it's mine I can't read. It's like trying to read in a dream, and the words slip out from under your eyes. I know what a kiss is like; I have memories, but they're not mine. Some of them are yours. I want to feel it for myself. Is that all this is, or is it something else?"

"Look at you, _mei mei._ You've grown up."

"No, Simon. Twenty-three is a number. Numbers deceive. They have no attachment to the reality inside of people. I don't know what to do. I'm still remembering how to be a girl, now part of me wants to be a woman – the foundations aren't in place. It's like the tall man said, your legs should be long enough to reach the ground. Well what if they aren't?"

"You'll be fine. You'll do fine. You were always ahead of everyone else – you always knew more about my love life than I did. Remember how I used to tease you and say you had a third eye?" Simon smiled. Every day she was more like the bright little sister he remembered.

River shook her head. "She's still broken – the girl you knew. I come out different, rebuilt. The memories come together like paint cracking in reverse, all of them – of you, _ge ge,_ of codes and games, of home and school….Of things from Serenity before Miranda that were lost in the chaos or misunderstood; that cracked and fragmented and got put back together wrong – plugged into the wrong places, positive to the negative contact and output to the input feed – putting it back together it's ugly and broken. Pieces missing. I'm not a girl who's lived twenty-three whole years. And I still need you, _ge ge._ "

"Tell me, _mei mei._ Tell me what it's like." Simon stroked River's hair the way he always did, the way that seemed to say _poor tortured head, let me make it better_.

"I remember things I've done – picked up guns and killed people like flipping a light switch in my head, no more meaning to it. Living was like painting on a canvas torn to pieces. Put the pieces back together and there's an ugly piece in my life. The wiring was all wrong – gun is an object, object is a branch. _Dian dao._ Gun is a symbol of death, and also protection. Remember that and I can bear it.

"Poor Kaylee. Frightened before and frightened after. I felt it. She told me in jest and I told her in truth. No power in the 'verse can stop me. Ugly to see the gun meant no more than the apple. Now I can eat the apple and protect with the gun and Kaylee doesn't have to be afraid. And I don't worry any more about what I might have done, and didn't. But there are burnt, blackened places that can't be fixed. Book. I hurt him. I tore him up, _ge ge_ , and it can't be fixed. Not now."

"I know, _mei mei._ That leaves a hole in all of us."

She cried, and Simon held her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Ai ya! Dui bu qi:** holy crap! Pardon me

 **Go se:** shit

 **Ke pa:** terrible, frightening

 **Kuang zhe de:** crazy, idiotic

 **Tian xiao de:** name of all that's sacred

* * *

Mal explained the situation to his crew as they sat around the kitchen table.

"I might be able to help here," said Fess. "Local law enforcement is different all over, but there's a basic principle – make the person in charge believe that what you want is also to their advantage." He looked at the skeptical expressions of those around him. "Well, at worst it could help provide a distraction for whatever you were planning on doing."

"All right," said Mal. "Here's the plan. Jayne and Fess, you take the shuttle, walk in the front door of the station and provide some kind of distraction. If words aren't enough I'm sure Jayne can think of something. Zoe and I will sneak in the back way and spring Monty. He'll recognize us both, know what's going on if things need to happen fast, with no explanations. We'll signal you when we're done and you can get out yourselves."

* * *

What followed was fun and action-packed. Jayne was amazed to hear the initially quiet Fess yelling and gesturing at the sheriff, explaining that his uncle was one of those taken into custody and Fess was _sure_ he wasn't involved, and mentioning powerful friends of his family.

Mal and Zoe took the hover-thingy by a slightly different route to arrive in back of the building just after the tirade got going. Unfortunately the entire group was being kept in one room and the only reason they weren't killing each other was that most of them were already injured or had spent most of the time since the brawl sleeping off a diverse array of headaches. They got Monty out and onto the mule, but as a result there was a mob of grumpy, bruised unification supporters running after them.

This would have been fine; the mule could outrun them with no problem, loaded with only three people, even if one of them was Monty. But some of them were that exact wrong combination of vengeful, stupid and living right in the neighborhood that they went home to get horses and guns and chase after.

They got to Serenity just before these men caught up. Kaylee had the door open for them. They were jumping off the hoverthingy when one of the stupid men fired a shot. In that moment the fun factor of the whole mission took a nosedive.

A child's shriek split the air, followed by Kaylee's yell. "Oh…oh, Banny…. _Simon!_ Simon, come quick!"

Mal turned and saw what had happened. His face went hard. " _Tian xiao de._ " Almost without looking he shot down the man who had fired. He fell off his horse, dead. The rest ran.

Zoe's voice was clipped and quiet. "Banny, honey. Listen to me. You're gonna be all right." She stroked her son's head as he lay on the deck.

The boy had gone pale; his usually rosy tan face was frighteningly gray. The right leg of his pants below the knee was rapidly turning dark with blood.

Simon went pale too when he saw that it was Banny who had been hurt…partly because of the knowledge of what Zoe could do to him if things went wrong at all. But he took in the scene, and he began doing his job.

* * *

Banny smiled slightly groggily up at his mother, who was holding his hand as Simon finished putting on the bandage.

"How you feeling, baby?"

"Not a baby," said Banny with a scowl.

"You just go on thinkin' that, honey. Now how's your leg?"

"It huwrts a little. An' my head feels funny."

"That's fine," the doctor said. "Tell me if it hurts more than a little and I'll give you more painkiller, but it would be better not to put any more into your system." He turned to Zoe.

"He's very lucky…the bullet went through cleanly, and nothing's broken. He's lost a significant amount of blood for that little body, so he's weak right now, but he'll recover quickly. In fact, Banny should be up wandering into places he shouldn't be again in a couple of days."

Zoe hugged Simon. There was no warning. The doctor was not entirely comfortable with this, especially since her grip was threatening to suffocate him. But he could feel the relief flow through her, one of the intense emotions that she hardly ever let show.

"Thank you," she whispered.

Then she broke her grip and turned away, back to her son. Her stance made it clear that the display was over and that he was no longer wanted here. It was as if it had never happened, as if the doctor wasn't even there. He left Zoe alone with her son.

* * *

Once Simon came and told Mal the kid would be OK, the captain could focus on the more pleasant aspects of this job.

"Hey, Monty! Your soup catcher! It's back!"

"Yeah, it is. Took a lot of trouble but I learned my lesson. Never trust a woman."

"Uh, Monty, there's somethin' I'm gonna have to tell you."

"Yeah, Mal?"

"Besides the fact that my second in command, pilot and engineer are all women."

"Well, crew don't count. Just don't let 'em in your bed."

"I'm gettin' married."

There was a pause, and then a huge belly laugh. "Ah, Mal, y'almost had me there for a second."

"Uh, no, Monty, I'm serious."

"What? Y'can't be!" Monty's huge hairy face came right up close to Mal's. This'll make anyone a bit nervous. But Mal held his gaze. "Aw, no, I thought you'd learned your lesson, too!"

"Yeah, I keep thinkin' I must be crazy, but I can't help myself. I love her, Monty."

"Yeh can't do this, Mal. They're all treacherous snakes like Bridget, damn her!"

Kaylee saw that things were turning sour. "Hey folks, calm down. Come on."

But they ignored her. "My Inara ain't no Saffron! Or whatever her name was. And I won't let you insult her!"

"Looks like I'm going to have to knock some sense into you, Mal!"

**BAM!**

Mal went down in one punch.

Kaylee ran to kneel by his side. "Cap'n! You all right?"

Zoë came up the stairs from the infirmary, carrying Banny. "Monty! What do you damn well think you're doing?"

Inara emerged from her shuttle and looked down at the captain, who was now groggily shaking his head. "What idiotic thing has Mal been doing now?"

"Fighting with Monty, looks like," said Zoë.

"Cap'n got huwrt too?" Banny asked.

"Yeah, honey. 'Cause he was being an idiot."

"Which one of you," said Monty, "did this?" He pointed down at Mal.

"I think _you_ did _that,_ " said Kaylee.

"Which one of you womenfolk seduced him into marryin' you?"

Inara came down the stairs, glaring at Monty. "If I had wanted to seduce him, I could have. But I didn't, all right? No matter how hard I tried to get him to leave me alone, he wouldn't. He didn't fall for my companion act. He fell for me."

Mal looked up at her. "'Nara, much as I love you, I gotta stop defendin' your honor. It hurts."

Monty shook his head. " _Kuang zhe de_."

Zoë said, "Monty, cool down. Inara's been part of our crew for years. 'Fact, if not for her, your Bridget would have taken off with one of our biggest payoffs."

Mal was sitting up now, and he looked at Inara, who was now kneeling beside him opposite Kaylee. He saw the concern mixed with annoyance in her eyes.

"See, I got punched, for standin' up for her, an' she's mad at me. That's pure Inara, an' no lie." He looked at Monty again. "Know what? Nothing you say is gonna stop me from believing Inara. And it startled me to no end when she said she'd be mine and mine only, but if she said it I don't doubt that it's true."

* * *

Kaylee was in her hammock, staring at her boots.

Jayne walked in. "Hey Kaylee, you got any o' that stuff you make in the engine?"

"Yeah, I might," she said. "What's the occasion?"

He avoided her gaze. "Just got back and heard what happened to the kid," said Jayne. "It's makin' me think, an' it ain't pleasant, an' I need somethin' to make it stop."

Anyone else would have teased Jayne for saying something like that, but not Kaylee. She just said, "Yeah, I know what you mean," and reached a cup and a bottle out of a secret nook.

He poured himself a generous amount, threw it down, and then said, "Well, if there ain't another cup hidden back there, you c'n use this one too. This stuf'll kill anything."

Kaylee smiled and thanked him, but she brought another cup out of hiding, and poured herself some.

"Good," said Jayne. "I din't come here plannin' on drinkin' alone."

She knew he had come here to talk out what was bothering him, but he wouldn't until he had a few more, so they lapsed into silence. Kaylee went back to staring at her boots, but she was glad he was there. Being alone wasn't so good for her right now either, though part of her wanted to be. The good thing about Jayne was that he wouldn't try to cheer her up.

"Wish I'd been there. Got no action at all. Jus' got t' ride in th' shuttle an' listen to an argument."

"I saw it, y'know. Just a baby, but he was strong, like his mama. Scared me more than it did him. _Go se,_ Jayne, it scared me."

"Shouldn' have happened. No reason for it."

"Some people can be awful mean, 'specially when they've drunk a bit too much."

"Golramit, there's such a thing as goin' too far. An' I don't do anythin' when 'm drunk I wouldn't do cold sober. Don' change who y'are."

"Yeah, well, ye're a nice drunk. 'Fact, I'd say ye're nicer when yer drunk. Y'ferget t'be all mean an' blockheaded." Kaylee smiled her sleepy-eyed smile at Jayne. "Th' doc's cert'nly more fun drunk, when you c'n get 'im to drink. Not t'day – he has a patient t'see to. That one time, tho, in that town with the statchew of you, got 'im to drink enough he almost talked normal."

"Th' doc can be annoyin' as hell, but we need 'im. Day like today…kid could've died. If it'd been worse…ain't none of us that'd know what t'do." Jayne's hand made a fist. "Golramit, I've seen hun'reds of people die, killed most of'em myself. It mos'ly don't bother me. Why now? The kid's all right…."

"You're dif'rnt, since Banny's born. I seen the way you look at 'im. First you lookt kinda scared, like th'world w's fallin' out from under yeh. Like Banny was to tiny to be real. But lately it's bin more like…determined. Like ye've got a mission."

"Zoe…she's the best fighter on this boat. I've got my own skills, and Mal's just insane, but Zoe's the strongest. My own momma don't know how close I come to dyin', what I do out here. An' I ain't tellin' her. There ain't many could do what Zoe does, raisin' a kid out here." Jayne held the empty bottle over his cup, the last drops falling. "That's the hardest thing in the 'verse – carin'. Really carin' about somethin' that could be gone in an instant. Bang. Gone." He threw the bottle aside violently.

Plastic hitting metal went _clunk._

"But I can't help carin' 'bout the kid."

* * *

Banny sat on River's lap as she watched over the controls.

"I wonder," said River. "Do you think you've been alive forever?"

"I w's nevur _not_ …alive."

"Yes, but was there a time when you didn't be yet?"

Banny's face scrunched in intense thought. "I don't wermember."

"Neither do I. I mean there was a time before I knew you, and a time when I knew Mother Zoe and there was nobody inside her, and then one day you were there and I thought maybe you had always been there and I couldn't tell."

"You c'd tell it was me?"

"Yes."

"Was I youw frend even when I was inside Mommy?"

"Yep. We've always been friends."

Banny thought for a minute. "That means I've always been."

River smiled. "You know, I think you're right."

Zoe came up the stairs. "Hey Banny. Thanks for lookin' after him, River."

"Any time," she said, and smiled, one of her new real smiles that were more and more common. She waved goodbye to Banny as they retreated down the stairs.

River spoke to Fess without waiting for a greeting. "You sneak, like me. Waiting in corners to hear, more important than being heard. That'll annoy Mal after a while…but I'll always hear you."

Fess stepped out from the corridor. "Why did you run away before?"

She looked at him and then away, out at the stars again. "The popular theory is that I'm not quite right in the head."

"I'm sure that's not true. You seem sane enough to me."

She gave him a Look. It was a searching look and a you're-missing-the-point look and it said a lot of things without really having much expression to it. "Do I?" she asked.

"Well, you are beginning to be creepy."

"I'm getting better," River said. "I'm not dangerous anymore. Not to people with acceptable intentions."

"Acceptable intentions?"

"Nobody's intentions are pure. No one I've ever read. Except Banny."

"So have you been this way your whole life? A reader? And…a bit strange?"

"No." She shook her head. "It could have just been a gift. Gifted. Like Simon. He knows more than he admits; the right medicine to give, the words to say, how to help someone hurt or panicked…. Just a gift. We could have lived a normal life. If they had just left me alone."

"Who?"

"You know I'm wanted? By the Alliance? All the bulletins, River Tam, dead or alive? You've seen them."

"That's you? But you don't look anything like that…you're beautiful."

"Ugly picture of an ugly…weapon. In a lot of ways the girl in the picture isn't me. Not even a person. They took me apart and put me together so I worked differently, took instructions, fought without feeling and felt without understanding. 'No one can shoot like that that's a person.' Kaylee said that once. She was right."

" _Ke pa._ "

"But I'm putting my mind back together. Simon lost everything to get me away from them, and he's helped more than he knows."

They both looked at the stars.

"Compared to that my life sounds so dull. But you sound like you would love to have a dull day."

"Sometimes I would. I remember before the Institute, before the experiments, everything seemed so slow. Simple and dull and everyday. I wanted so badly to experience something else. Now I would love just to spend a day going to classes and talking to friends and being normal. Safe. Not worrying. I can't ever go back to that. But now Serenity is home."

Fess sighed. "Am I wrong to want the same thing? To get away from the way things have been for as long as I can remember? Am I weak for running away from the challenges that I did have there?"

"You just realized that you've never had to be strong. How can a man know he is a man without a battle to fight?"

"Today was exciting," he said. "I never knew I could be that person that I was today. Somehow I was so sure of myself and what I needed to say. Somehow…today changed me more than anything else that's happened to me."

"Maybe because it didn't just happen to you. You made it happen."

Fess looked at River. She seemed to know him better than he knew himself, and they had only talked twice. And she was beautiful.

"You want to kiss me." Like so many of the things she said, it could have been a question and wasn't.

"Would you like me to?"

She thought. "The idea is worth experimenting with." Then she laughed. "Words make funny thoughts and ripples in your brain."

She stood up and moved towards him, only a little hesitantly.

A moment later Simon came up the steps. "River?" he was calling. Then he saw them. " _Ai ya! Dui bu qi_." He went away muttering, "the longer I spend on this ship the smaller it gets."


	4. Chapter 4

**Di di:** little brother

 **Dong ma:** understand?

 **Mei miao:** beautiful (art)

 **Yao jing:** evil spirit/alluring woman

**Jie you xiang si fou,**

**Ying wu bu wu shi.**

Whether the willow can love or not,

Never a time when it does not dance.

\- Li Shang-yin

* * *

Fess was exploring the kitchen and preparing to make dinner, and River was working on her picture. Mal had all his guns laid out on the table again and he was cleaning them. Fess thought he looked rather busy and didn't distract him. Then Zoë and little Hoban came in and sat down at the table.

"Hey, little Ban," said Mal. "Zoë, you think maybe you should keep the little one away from here right at this moment?"

"Don't worry, sir. I know what I'm doing."

"Okay then," said Mal, and inched the nearest gun away from the child, then went back to cleaning.

"All right, Banny," said Zoë, "I'm gonna teach you about guns today."

"Awuight, Mommy."

River put down her picture and went to watch.

"Guns are important. They're for protecting people. Mal takes good care of his guns. See how careful he is with them?"

"Yeah," said Banny. "Like how Kaylee takes good caor of Seuenity, wruight?"

"Yeah. Just like that. You have to love and respect a gun and it won't let you down."

"Okay."

"Now on a normal day, when we wake up and we work and we play and we eat and we see the people that we know on the boat, I don't want you to ever touch a gun."

"Okay."

"No touching guns," muttered River. "Output to the input feed."

"And when Mommy's doing work and there are strange people here, even if bad things happen, stay away from the strange people and don't touch any guns."

"Okay."

"The only time it's okay to touch a gun is when someone's trying to hurt you. If somebody tries to hurt you, you shoot him."

"Mmm, okay."

Zoë took her own gun out of its holster. "Most of the guns on Serenity are loaded. I'm gonna take the bullets out of this one, which makes it safe to hold right now. But right now is special. It's not gonna happen again. Feel how heavy it is? With bullets it's a little heavier. Here's the safety; you have to move it like this before you use it. Then you aim, and you pull here."

"It's cold."

"That it is, Banny. Mommy's gonna take it back now."

"Okay."

"Now remember, don't touch any of these unless someone tries to hurt you. That probably won't happen. And the best way to keep it from happening is to stay out of the way when Mommy's working, even if it doesn't seem dangerous. _Dong ma?_ "

"Okay."

"Come on, honey. Time to go wash up for supper." Zoë left with her son in tow.

Fess looked at River. "It's hard for me to imagine growing up in a place where a child needs to be told that. But I guess kids are born everywhere. It happens where there's love, and there's love here."

River took hold of his hand and placed it against Serenity's wall. "Here the only thing that separates us from the black is cold steel. Life and death walk close together. There's a beauty in it, to see that line clearly. It's what draws us to this life. The captain likes to say that the woods are the only place he can see a clear path. Safety is an illusion."

"You're quite a poet. That's one of the things I've missed in my life. My father is not a real appreciator of beauty. And not just because he lives on a planet covered in mud. I'm sure a poet like you could find beauty anywhere."

"Zoë is beautiful when she's with Banny. Mothers make everything make sense. It's easier to put the pieces together when you have someone to explain. Even if it looks like you're too old to need it." River kissed Fess on the cheek, grinned, stole a piece of the carrot he had been cutting, and ran away.

* * *

Eventually Mal finished what he was doing and went to put away all the shiny guns.

Fess was finishing up making dinner when Inara came in. "Hello, Inara," he said.

"Hello, Fess." She nodded to him with a carefully neutral look on her face, and seeing that he was the only one there, she walked on to the opposite door.

"Wait. I'd like to talk to you."

She smiled. "I'm glad. I'd enjoy having a conversation with you."

"I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate what you did for me. Back home on Higgins Moon."

"You're very welcome. But is this going to be awkward for you? Being on Serenity with me?"

"I don't think it will. I thought it might be at first, but some things have happened since then. Would it be strange of me to say that you were more like a mother to me than anything else?"

"I think it's safe to say that while your father requested that I come for a very specific reason, that wasn't the part of the experience that was most important to you."

"That's very true. I suppose it's not in my father's nature to appreciate the company of a woman for her skill in conversation."

"Now that is a great pity."

"Yes, it is. If he did, I might have had a mother to grow up with, to teach me some of the things you did." He paused. "Did I make things difficult with you and the captain?"

"Don't worry, he's all right. …He knows it hurts me as much as him to remember how I used to live my life. So many people, and I didn't realize how lonely I was. But Serenity's always felt like home. I just had to let go and let myself feel it. Realize that it didn't make me weak that I couldn't live without someone."

* * *

They all had dinner together around the table. Although the family still missed its lost pieces, it was growing again.

At one end of the table Fess, River, Simon and Inara were talking about art or something intelligent, while at the other end Jayne, Kaylee, Mal and Zoe were busy introducing Banny to Monty, who were both amazed at the size difference involved. But then they all joined in the discussion of what had happened after Bridget had been kicked off Monty's ship, and how Inara had saved the day. Monty laughed quite hard when he heard about the naked part. Inara even blushed a little.

Everyone told Fess how good the food was, although Jayne muttered something about "anything would be better than when it's Mal's turn to cook."

* * *

Inara was annoyed. Three guesses who with.

Sometimes she wondered why she agreed to marry him. But really, looking at him, she knew.

Inara wanted Mal so much it hurt.

And Serenity was home. All these people were family. More than anyone else had ever been.

She related best to Simon in a way…they came from similar worlds, were used to certain comforts. Like knowing you weren't going to be in jail tomorrow. But then he got to talking about how happy Kaylee looks when she's elbow deep in engine parts and her face and hands are smudged with black grease.

And she thought of Mal coming back from a job where maybe everything didn't go right as planned but everyone's back home safe with enough to keep flying. And he's covered in dust and grinning and just radiating warmth.

And Inara feels this pull…

Never felt it before, not like this.

She remembers, once:

"Inara, will you stoop to bein' on my arm?"

"Will you wash it first?" she had said.

But you don't clean Mal up. Don't brush off the dust and try and make him look civilized. The dust is part of him. Part of what makes her, unaccountably, want him.

And really the dust has an honest dry cleanness to it that the city never had. Her put together glamour didn't always mean that she felt that way.

What was it the Shepherd had once told her? It's more important that the inside of the cup be clean, than the outside.

_He does take life seriously….what's right. What I chose to take seriously turned out not to be as important. So stubborn…both of us. One had to bend enough to admit that they might be wrong. And I was wrong._

He was what she wanted, wanted more than anything, flaws and all. No matter how complicated that made things for both of them, she couldn't make it stop.

She sighed. "Whatever we decide, it'll be beautiful. Even if we get married in the middle of the desert. But I'd prefer at least someplace with a floor."

He said, "Dammit, woman, stop doin' that to my neck. You're makin' my head all fuzzy." But he said it softly.

She whispered in his ear, "Only fair. You do the same to me."

He raised his eyebrows and leaned away from her. "Inara, sometimes, I swear, you're worse than Saffron."

She was starting to be annoyed again. "If you keep bringing up that…that… _yao jing_ …Mal, I'll douse you with perfume, don't think I won't."

"Inara, I'm marrying _you_ on purpose. There is not one part of me that regrets leaving her shut up in that dumpster. No call to be jealous." Mal looked at her with his gently mocking smile that had so much warmth behind it. "It's just sometimes I get nervous about all this training of yours….same training she used, and she almost killed me and all o' mine without firing a shot."

He shook his head with mock sorrow. "And what scares me is I think it's working…all right, you win. Buddhist temple it is."

She smiled. _Maybe he's bending a bit too._

* * *

_Walking gently on the rough with the bare feet, walking mindfully. Part says there should be a planet underneath, but Serenity has a little soul of a mother-world. She nurtures with no dirt, warms best she can with no sun. Only her metal walls and her engines. Walk gently anyway. You learn things, through the skin…._

River felt Fess watching her. She ignored him, listening to Serenity for a minute longer. _Di di_ was sleeping. _Good, healing. So is the mother_. _(Mother in the mother-world. She's broken up plenty, but she'll fly true…protect all the children.)_

Fess was close behind her now.

" _Jie you xiang si fou/Ying wu bu wu shi._ "

"Such a strange willow, her roots twined in deck plates. But _jie you xiang si fou?_ I do. I love all of them." River's hand rested against the wall. "All of Serenity's children."

Fess took her hand away from the wall and held it in his. "I mean, can you leave them for a moment, and be with just me?"

River took a breath. She had to be sure….Yes. Sure, steady. Her legs were long enough to touch the ground, even from way out here in the black. She wanted this. She nodded.

He kissed her, more intensely than before. And again.

_I remember feelings like this…like the ocean swaying…from the mother, Zoe. Deep ocean. Dark waves on a sandy shore. Wash, they wash, he felt them break. Constant. Forceful. Like Zoe…but this is different._

Then they were in his bunk…the getting there part was fuzzy. No shoes for her to take off, good, but his…that had to be done. Quickly. But not without interruption.

_It's being River. The rushing of water is in her ears. It flows, always moves…splash your feet in it, never the same River twice. Can't follow her. –Oh –h ….but no one has swum in her before. Being carried away, and the River with it, the water, the water is the River, and him being carried away with it…._

_Take off your shoes or you'll drown,_ she laughed.

And then even her constantly shifting brain had thought ripped from it by waves of feeling.

…

They lay curled in his bunk. River's head was on his shoulder.

River put her graceful hand over Fess's heart. She looked into his eyes. "Now I own your soul."

He looked at her perfectly solemn face, and remembered her power, her strangeness. "What? Are you some kind of ghost? What have I done?"

She laughed, loudly, with mischievous joy. "Everyone always believes her when she says things like that."

Fess laughed too. "You're crazy."

"Say River is crazy – everyone does. But I know how you mean it."

They were silent for a minute.

River spoke first. "You're thinking it's different than with Inara."

"It is – completely different. That time – it wasn't exactly my choice. I am glad that it happened. It made me realize a lot of things. But this time…it was better."

River just smiled.

"Inara studied all this. It's like an art form to her, I suppose. She practices to get better at what she does. But with you, everything seemed natural, like it was just supposed to happen that way. It was amazing."

She whispered. "I feel…everything. I feel what you feel. For the first time my gift is exactly what I want. To feel everything." She laughed. "Even you feeling awkward. It makes me feel less awkward."

"You felt awkward? It didn't seem like it."

"I've never done this before."

"Oh," he said. He looked at her. "Even so, _mei miao._ "

 

 


End file.
